


Speak Their Name Over My Grave

by QuickSilverFox3



Series: Whumptober 2020 [19]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Character Death, Dementia, Double Drabble, Drabble Collection, Dystopia, Established Relationship, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Loss of Immortality, Missing Scene, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Suicide Attempt, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:26:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27284890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuickSilverFox3/pseuds/QuickSilverFox3
Summary: “He’s waking up,” Nicky whispered, breaking the hushed silence, crouching down to cup Booker’s cheek, fingers rasping against his beard.“This isn’t the first time.” Andy’s voice was flat, carefully walking forward, her feet bumping into empty bottles.[No 19. BROKEN HEARTS Grief | Mourning Loved One | Survivor’s Guilt]
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia & Booker | Sebastien le Livre, Andy | Andromache of Scythia & Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, Andy | Andromache of Scythia & Lykon & Quynh | Noriko, Booker | Sebastien le Livre & Nicky | Nicolo di Genova, Booker | Sebastien le Livre & Quynh | Noriko, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: Whumptober 2020 [19]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1947016
Comments: 2
Kudos: 46
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Speak Their Name Over My Grave

Nicky stumbled backwards, one hand flying to his mouth as the other stretched out to Andy, but it was too late. Her eyes were failing, the world turning into a blurred patchwork of colour, but she could see the blood covering the wall above Booker’s slumped body.

“He’s waking up,” Nicky whispered, breaking the hushed silence, crouching down to cup Booker’s cheek, fingers rasping against his beard.

“This isn’t the first time.” Andy’s voice was flat, carefully walking forward, her feet bumping into empty bottles. The taste of iron coated her tongue, the wall behind Booker stained brown and mottled.

* * *

Joe tipped his face up to the warmth of the sun, breathing in the sweet scent of pine. Exhaustion found him easier now, understanding Andy’s complaints.

“Here.” Quynh tossed him a phone, call already connected, a distant look in her eyes.

“I miss you already, my love,” Joe whispered, Nicky’s sob audible through the receiver. 

“Joe, my love, please.” Joe closed his eyes, turning away from the phone, guilt crushing his heart in his chest. “Tell me where you are.”

“I can’t and I won’t, habibi,” Joe whispered, the blade cold against his neck. “I need you to be safe.”

✦

“I _need_ you to be with me.” Nicky’s voice broke, kneeling on the sun-warmed floor of the small house they owned. Joe was everywhere he looked: the blanket drawn over the sofa for when the nights grew too cold, his row of spices identified by smell rather than the labels. Nicky couldn’t face life without him, even as Joe’s hair turned to silver while Nicky remained unchanged.

“I love you,” Joe whispered, pouring centuries of affection into the three words.

“I love you,” Nicky replied, trying to imprint Joe’s voice onto his soul.

The line went dead, and Nicky screamed.

* * *

Nile tapped the chip in her wrist at the scanner, tugging at the fabric of the mask stretched over her nose. The shift from the eerie chill of the air conditioning to the blazing heat always stole her breath away from her weakened lungs. 

She started to walk down the cracked pavement, cataloging the changes in her mnd, thoughts wandering through the centuries. She was the only one who could remember them now, the last Immortal. Her dreams were filled with the faces of people long dead, and she would be joining them soon. Nile grinned gently, the movement unseen.

* * *

Nothing felt real anymore.

Andy could see the others, picture their faces in her mind when her eyes failed her, but the details escaped her. 

“Where am I?” she asked the person at her bedside, feeling their grip tighten momentarily on her wrist. 

“Malta, Andy.”

“Hmmmm.” Andy shifted deeper into her nest of cushions. “What am I doing here?”

“A holiday, boss.” She opened her eyes a crack, seeing the man grin at the movement, tucking some of his dark curls back behind his ears. “Do you want something to eat?”

“Baklava,” she murmured, frowning slightly. “Joe? Where am I?”

  
  


* * *

There was never enough time. 

Joe had traced the bruises on Nicky’s neck which bore the imprint of his own teeth from the night before with a look of dawning horror, and Nicky knew he would run out of time, that every breath he took was stolen.

Nicky was going to die. And Joe was not. 

They’d never been apart, not truly since their first deaths, swords buried deep into the other’s chest, and there was poetry in that. Joe kissed him fiercer, hands trembling as if Nicky would break beneath him. And Nicky fought against the passage of time.

✦

“Caro…”

“ _Si_?”

Nicky was drawn into a kiss with barely a glance, pressing himself close to try and etch the sensation onto Yusuf’s memory. 

“Please sit.” Joe’s fingers shifted to the patch of skin just behind his ear, Nicky leaning into the gesture with a sigh.

“I need to finish this, my love.” Nicky kissed him again, swallowing down Joe’s noise of protest as Nicky’s stubble scratched against his cheeks.

“But why?”

“For…” Nicky chewed on his lip, tucking another roll of bills into the bag. “After. So you don’t have to worry, when I cannot for you, my love.”

* * *

Pain was everywhere, burning like a wildfire through his chest, blood spilling out with every heartbeat that passed to feed the thirsty desert.

Lykon knew he was going to die by the horror in Andy’s eyes, the rage in Quynh’s snarl.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, voice breaking as the pain threatened to overwhelm him.

“We can fix this,” Andy swore, the grief in her voice enough to send cold shivers down his spine, the edges of his being growing cold.

“You need to remember.” Lykon didn’t know if she had heard him. They no longer had forever in their grasp.

* * *

“I’m going to die soon.”

Quynh saw Booker’s flash of hope in the slight widening of his eyes, the press of his tongue against his lips; but he didn’t stop working, clever fingers priming the bomb she was forcing him to make.

Andy had not been cruel to him in the way she had and was to Quynh, until she cast him out, broken and breaking further everyday.

“See?” She stretched out her hand, the cut scabbed at the edges but not healed. “You could even kill me right now.”

She laughed. “But you won’t. My vengeance will be glorious.”

* * *

“Who’s that?” 

The dust clung to Nile’s fingers as she passed the small portrait to Andy, the other woman reaching back as far as Quynh, curled up in her lap, would let her.

“Lykon.” Andy traced the curve of his smile, flashed after every successful mission. “He died long before the century that was painted, but Quynh and I described him well.”

“You’ve mentioned him.”

Andy saw some refracted memory of Lykon in the way Nile moved, proud down to her bones.

“He is a good man.”

Quynh grumbled, “He threw us both into a river when we first met.”


End file.
